


Imagine Being Loved By Me

by AndreaLyn



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Phone Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-14 07:57:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20188918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndreaLyn/pseuds/AndreaLyn
Summary: "Thanks for calling 1-800-GET-SOME. How can I make your dreams come true today?"Alex does not call sex hotlines, unless he loses a bet and calls in to hear a very familiar voice asking how he can fulfill his fantasies.





	Imagine Being Loved By Me

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to islndgrl777 for beta-reading when my brain was soup!
> 
> Title is from _Talk_ by Hozier.

It’s not like Michael is ever going to be flush with money. That’s a reality he’s come to grips with, and he’s fine with that. Well, not fine, but he’s accepted it.

The summer of 2016 is different than his usual money woes, though. It’s the summer where he’s too late to offer his help on any of the ranches before the seasonal help comes on and even though Sanders is happy to let him pick up work, people aren’t bringing their cars in that much. 

It’s the damn new car dealership in town, offering shit for a lot cheaper than Sanders can afford to, which means Michael’s out of work.

He’s starving, most days. He’s also too proud to look for certain types of work, but he needs to figure out something or he’ll end up scrounging in the trash outside the Crashdown the way he used to when he was fifteen and meals never made it to the table at the home because God somehow needed their offerings more than Michael had needed food.

His salvation comes out of nowhere, when he’s with Isobel to watch her get a manicure. He’s tuning out, flipping through a magazine, while the nail tech tells Isobel about her cousin. “I mean, it’s practically a step away from whoring yourself out, but he swears all he does is talk on the phone with them. It’s basically phone sex.”

“Phone sex with strangers,” Isobel points out, arching her brow.

“Phone sex with strangers and he gets paid twenty-five bucks an hour,” is the reply.

Michael puts down his magazine and suddenly finds himself much more interested in this nail salon. While Isobel is at the front paying (and trying to negotiate a deep condition for Michael’s hair), he drifts back to the tech and leans up against the wall by her.

“That place your cousin works,” he starts, and he tries not to blush when the woman gives him a smirk that can see right into his soul. “You got the information?”

She turns and scribbles a web address and a phone number. “The first is the phone line, the second is my cousin, in case you want to make sure you’re not about to be sold into human trafficking.”

At this point, given how hungry he is, Michael’s not even sure that it would be a bad thing. It’s that or give up his pride and march to Isobel and Noah’s for those dinners he really tries to avoid. Isobel comes to drag him away as Michael mouths ‘thank you’ and tucks the card in his pocket, neatly avoiding Isobel treating him like her grown-up Ken doll to play with.

When she drops him off at the Airstream, she turns the engine off. 

That’s not a good sign.

Rolling his eyes, he lets his neck loll to the side to give her the ever-impatient look of a brother who’s already fed up with whatever it is she wants to get on his case about. “What?” he demands.

“You’ve lost weight,” Isobel says evenly. “I know you don’t want me to notice, but I have. Michael, do you need money? I can give you money.”

Every prideful bone in his body flinches. “I’m not some charity case, Iz,” he snaps, and unlocks the door. “Save it for whatever pathetic cause you’re sponsoring a party for this week. I’m fine,” he insists, like he isn’t about to stretch out a bag of rice for the next week and that he only got that bag because he’d picked it up from the grocery trash since it had a giant rip in it. 

She doesn’t believe him, but she doesn’t need to. 

Michael’s pissed her off enough that she leaves, giving Michael a chance to dig out the business card from his pocket, staring at the website address. 

He does his research. It’s not like it’s the best website in the world, but a few phone calls and references and he finds out that it’s legit. He can work remotely and calls will be directed to him. He’ll be recorded from time to time and Michael has the world’s strangest interview where he basically has to get the interviewer hot and bothered. 

By the end of that call, the interviewer is breathing heavily. 

“So,” Michael quips, because if he knows one thing, it’s that he can talk a good game. “I got the job?”

“Keep an eye for a package in the mail. It’ll have your papers, the phone you’ll use, and the welcome package. Congratulations, Mr. Guerin.” 

The phone turns up at his Airstream two weeks later along with a thick packet of instructions. He signs the contract, sends it back, and then gets to work. Within a few weeks, he’s able to feed himself and even put in a few upgrades on his truck and the Airstream that he’d been putting off. It’s really not so bad.

Not everyone wants sex, even. He gains a couple clients who want nothing more than to roleplay out a domestic scene, cuddling up in bed. The ones who do want the dirty talk appreciate Michael’s tendency to get right to the heart of things, and though he knows this is a per-minute thing, he prides himself in making people come quicker than they expected to.

It's a decent gig and an easy way to make money.

Of course, that’s when things get complicated.

He gets a new client who isn’t like any of the others – it just so happens to also be the last new client he’ll ever take.

* * *

Alex Manes does not call sex hotlines. 

Then again, Alex also doesn’t routinely lose bets, but he’d been _convinced_ that Matthews in the other unit was definitely giving him looks, but it turns out that he only cared about the name on Alex’s jacket and not the body under it. The moment he’d discovered Matthews only wanted the respect of Jesse Manes had been the moment Alex lost all respect for him.

He should have also been smart enough not to bet with carte blanche to let the guys make him do anything they wanted, but it’s been a long few weeks of _nothing_ and maybe Alex had been feeling a little dangerous.

“You guys are making me feel sad,” he protests, and sighs as he dials the numbers on the business card in front of him. This is what happens when he loses a bet, though, and fair is fair. That said, fair also means using voice modification software because the last thing he needs are recordings of his voice calling in to ask for a good time ending up in his father’s lap. 

Richards had been the one to offer up the perfect punishment for Alex. “I mean,” he says. “We all know how much you like your hand.”

“And that you named it Michael,” Anderson quips, waggling his brows as he kisses his closed fist. “Oh, _Michael_.”

“Yeah,” adds O’Brien, since apparently everyone in his unit is a filthy traitor. “Maybe you can find someone who’ll lend an ear, since they can’t manage a hand.”

Alex glowers at them as he listens to the line connect. He has to go through a few steps where he tells an operator what he’s after, settling on ‘a quick and dirty time’ while his cheeks flush furiously red. Then he’s re-routed and guaranteed a good time. 

The line rings a few times before another person picks up. 

“Thanks for calling 1-800-GET-SOME,” the voice on the other end drawls in greeting, casual as you please, like Alex hasn’t called to have phone sex with a stranger. The voice is oddly familiar. He swears that he knows it, but maybe he’s just reading into things. Maybe it’s just that Alex keeps hearing this voice in his dreams, and he keeps imagining that he can hear it in his waking hours, too, only it’s never him. “How can I make your dreams come true today?”

He needs to be on the phone for at least ten minutes, those are the stipulations of the bet. 

This would be a lot easier if he didn’t have three other men watching him. Sighing, he puts the phone down and presses the speaker button, since he refuses to chicken out. Next time, he’s just going to have to be a lot more careful about the bets he makes, or who he thinks is coming on to him. 

“Hey, baby,” Alex starts. “I’m looking for a good time. You got a name?”

“I do.”

“You gonna tell me?”

The voice laughs and breathes out slowly, which is when Alex’s doubts evaporate. This isn’t wishful thinking. He’d know Michael Guerin’s soft breaths and his laugh _anywhere_. Panic flashes over his eyes because he wants to pick up the phone and take it off speaker, but if he does that, the guys are going to know that something’s up. 

“You and I both know that’s not how this works.”

“I have to call you something,” Alex counters, glancing at the clock. Maybe if he can run this down, he won’t have to get into embarrassing sex talk. That’s the kind of thing he doesn’t want to do in front of his buddies.

Especially not when he’s 99.9% sure that this is Michael on the other end of the line.

That brings up a whole slew of different questions – namely, why is Michael Guerin working on a sex line? Also, what are the odds that Alex calls in and gets him? Maybe there is something about the two of them that’s connected in a way that Alex doesn’t want to acknowledge.

That low laughter is back. “You do,” he agrees. “You can call me Cowboy. What am I calling you?”

“Private,” he says, even though he hasn’t been that lowly ranked in years. Alex’s heart is pounding wildly in his chest as he glances to the clock. Seven more minutes, and he doubts that he can distract Michael with asking about the weather back home (assuming he is still back home). “Tell me what you’re wearing?” 

It’s safe, for any given value of safety. If they burn time talking about clothing, then Alex can prevent this from getting embarrassing. 

“Well, like you might imagine, I got a cowboy hat on my head. Black Stetson.”

Alex furrows his brow, trying to remember if he’d ever seen Michael wearing the hat back home, but he can’t recall. Likely, it’s a new thing, but he digs his nails into his khaki pants, nodding like somehow Michael can see him. “That’s it?” he can’t help quipping.

“Play your cards right and that can be all, but nah, not yet. I also have a belt buckle and a pair of jeans, plus one of those old white t-shirts that’s so used that it’s practically see-through. You can see my nipples through it, especially when someone’s been playing with them and has got me going.”

Alex is licking his lower lip, glancing at the clock. Five minutes, but within the first five, Michael’s already got him so worked up that he’s probably going to need a very cold shower. 

“Are you gonna return the favor? Or am I gonna have to guess what you’re wearing?”

Yes, somehow, yup, that seems safer. “Yeah. Do that.”

“Well, Private, if that is your real assignment. In my mind, you’re wearing this ridiculous camouflage outfit. Maybe the pants are a little too baggy because you’re wearing a hand-me-down from an older brother because everyone in your family has to walk the same line,” Michael says, and Alex’s heart starts beating faster.

This isn’t some hypothetical soldier in Michael’s mind, is it?

“Still, you look really hot in it. The little hat is a nice touch, and the dog tags…oh, baby, I’m gonna enjoy pulling on those later to yank you in and kiss you until you’re on your knees and begging to take me instead of thinking about reporting to your senior officer.” Alex shifts until he's sitting on his hands, trying so hard not to react even though he can feel everyone’s attention on him. “I’d mess up that approved hairstyle until you’re in so much trouble that you’ll be cleaning toilets for weeks.”

“Confident, aren’t you?”

“That I could have you begging for me? Yeah,” Michael drawls out that word. “You challenging me? Implying I can’t?”

Alex shakes his head until O’Brien shoots him an eye-roll, reminding him that he needs to speak. 

“No, not a challenge, just observing that you seem pretty self-assured in your skill in taking someone apart.”

There’s a long pause, which is gold for the ticking clock. It’s not so good for Alex’s heart, which rockets into his throat as he thinks about losing Michael even though he’s only found him in the oddest of places. “I used to be,” is what he says. “Used to be, I thought that with a single kiss, I could make someone stay with me.”

If that’s not a mood killer, then Alex doesn’t know what is. 

“Time!” Anderson mouths, and Alex’s head falls forward in relief.

“Sorry about this Cowboy, but I’ve gotta go,” Alex rushes through the words. “I bet you’re right, though. I bet your kisses could make someone stay forever, if they had enough courage to follow their heart.” He hangs up before Michael can respond, tucks it away in his pocket, then gives the other guys a dubious look. “What! I felt bad.”

“Whatever, the bet’s done,” Richards says, clapping Alex’s shoulder. “Next time, maybe don’t let us pick _anything_ as a consequence and you won’t end up calling a sex line to hear some cowboy’s dulcet tones try and bring you off.”

They push at him to get him moving to the mess hall, but Alex insists that he’s going to tidy up before he joins them. The other guys head off, which gives Alex the opportunity to pick up the little business card with the hotline’s number on it. He shouldn’t. He should leave well enough alone and let Michael get on with his life, even if this is the last thing he’d expected him to do.

Alex tucks the card into his pocket.

It's not like Michael knows it’s him and he’s not spending his money on anything else. What’s the harm?

* * *

The next night, Alex doesn’t _need_ to call in. He hasn’t lost a bet and the guys aren’t bugging him, but he’s got some time and he has his cell and he _wants_ to. He dials the sex line, acutely aware that he could be racking up a huge bill, but it’s not like his salary is going towards anything else.

“I wanna talk to Cowboy,” he says, when he gets to the operator.

“One moment.”

The hold music is laughably classy given what the line is, but soon Vivaldi becomes a man’s voice. Belatedly, Alex pulls the phone away to put on the voice modification, because if he’s right about his suspicions, the last thing he needs is to be found out. 

“Cowboy here. Who have I got the pleasure of talking with?” It’s Michael’s voice all right, honeyed and sweet and lazy. If Alex closes his eyes, he can picture him relaxing against his bed, a hand absently in his lap, fingers stroking slowly. 

Alex swallows his nerves. “Private,” he replies, croaking out the name that he’d given yesterday. “It’s Private, again.” 

“Last night wasn’t enough? You had to talk to me again?”

One night is never going to be enough. He wants to be able to have every night with Michael, something that he’d really come to terms with during his last leave. His father had kept him busy, but that hadn’t stopped him from staring longingly at Michael the whole time, thinking about stupid ideas like leaving the military and becoming a civilian to be with him.

He’d actually thought about deliberately going in the face of his father’s wishes, then his fear had kicked back in. That’s why he’s sitting in a tent in a dusty desert with a satellite phone, using up all his minutes and free time to call Michael.

Correction, he’s calling a sex line. Michael just so happens to be working it.

“I had to run and you were just getting going,” Alex says. “Tell me more about these kisses of yours. I’m intrigued to hear more about how they can take a man apart…”

That becomes the start of a very bad habit, but now that Alex has managed to find a thread back to Michael, he’s not sure he could let go of it, not even when it’s costing him $2.99 per minute.

* * *

“There was this guy who kissed me once and he made me feel like I was home. As if I didn’t need a white picket fence, so long as I had him”

“I could kiss you like that.”

“I know you could, but I’m so far from home right now.”

“When you get back, I’ll slide my fingers over your body and kiss you like you’re the only home I ever need.”

“Yeah. Maybe.” Alex stares forlornly at the picture of him and Michael with their guitars in the desert. “When I come home.” _To you_.

* * *

“I want to touch you,” Alex begs one desperate night. “Let me?”

“I’ll do anything you want, Private. You tell me what you need and I’ll give it to you.”

“_Everything_,” Alex gasps, and closes his eyes as Michael spends the next ten minutes taking him apart and then putting him back together.

* * *

“I want your mouth on me,” Alex begs. “I want you on your knees and I want you to worship me. When I close my eyes, I think about your lips all swollen from kissing you for hours in our bedroom. I think about how they’re so full to begin with and then red from me biting them. I think about my hands sliding through your hair to push you down to your knees, then fucking your face as you dig your nails into my hips, making crescent marks that I can brush my fingers over. Your finger near my ass, teasing and toying with some lube, preparing me, making me so ready. Then, you fuck me once your mouth has been fucked raw and when you cry my name, you can barely get it out. And after, after, we lie together and I keep you safe and close and warm. In the morning, I’m still there. I haven’t left.”

_I haven’t left you, I haven’t made the same mistake, I’m sorry, if you’ll only have me back._

“Shit,” comes Michael’s voice on the other end. “Are you sure I’m the one with the job trying to get people off? You’re pretty damn good at this.”

“When I have the right inspiration, it’s easy.”

“And here I thought you were the only easy one.”

Alex’s laugh is a huff over the line, but he’s smiling again. “For you? _Yeah_.”

* * *

“What do you want, Private?”

There’s a long pause on the other end of the line. For a moment, it seems that he might have lost him on the other end of the line. 

“I want the man I love.” There he is and something like guilt floods him. “I want to tell him that when he kissed me, I felt like I’d found home. I want him to hold me the way he did, to kiss me until my knees buckle, to keep him warm and safe. I want to wake up to him in the morning and kiss every one of his fingers, _every single one_, and then I’ll tell him that I’m sorry that what happened did. I want the stars above us to shine as much as they did the first time we kissed in that stupid small room and I want him. I just want him. ”

Michael’s stomach turns and he thinks…

No. It can’t be. It can’t. 

“I’ve spent so many years running from it, but I don’t think I can anymore. I want him. I love him.” 

Michael exhales, “Alex?” but the line had gone dead before he could get the first syllable out. He stares at his cell phone and knows. He _knows_. This isn’t just anyone that’s been calling him and taking him apart with his words. It’s Alex, only it’s Alex hiding behind a different voice and the miles that keep them apart.

He stares at his phone and asks himself what he’s supposed to do now, not sure there is a right answer.

* * *

Michael should know better. 

He should leave well enough alone, but the fact that he’s had a regular caller for the last two years has sparked his curiosity. They always ask for him and they always use that stupid voice modification software. It makes them sound normal enough, but there’s always hints of it, like auto-tune in the background.

That last call had taken suspicions and turned them to certainty. It’s no stranger that he’s been developing this intimacy with – it’s _Alex_.

He glances to his other messages. Isobel has been calling him constantly to remind him that the reunion is only a few months away. She expects him to be there, which is ridiculous considering the fact that the only good thing about high school had been what it had brought him with Alex. He doesn’t need a stupid dance to remind him about what he had with him.

At least, not when he’s got these twice-weekly phone calls with him to do it for him.

Still, Michael’s beginning to wonder if he’s going to keep getting those phone calls. If Alex is back home, then maybe the shadow of his father’s controlling desires is going to remind Alex why he went in the first place. On the other hand, Michael has to wonder if the last two years of phone calls will change things.

Alex has to know, doesn’t he?

He's never used Michael’s name, he’s never asked if it’s him, but he has to, right?

He’ll need to wait and hope that Alex calls again. If he does, then Michael can put this to bed, make sure they’re on the same page and see if they both have the courage to say what they say anonymously to one another’s faces.

* * *

Alex never calls again after that last time. 

Michael tries so hard not to let that break his heart. He doesn’t succeed. The next day, he quits his work at the hotline because he’s not so desperate for money these days and he’s not sure his heart could bear to work that job without knowing that a call with Alex was right around the corner.

* * *

The next week, Maria tells him that Alex lost his leg. 

Isobel is planning a parade for a hero’s welcome home.

They won’t give him the phone numbers for any of his clients, and Michael goes wild with anger. He ends up locked in the drunk tank six nights out of seven, he breaks almost everything in the Airstream and then spends two days repairing things. He slumps over with the phone and wonders if he had said something different, could he have prevented it from happening?

What if he’d begged Alex to come back home? 

Michael gets drunk again to try and stop himself from feeling that deep well of grief that he hadn’t been able to protect Alex from the war. Phone calls and desperate need are a shitty substitute for actually being there. 

Still, he’s home now. 

They can talk about the phone calls. They can figure out what they mean and if Alex had meant everything that he’d said. If he did, then it doesn’t matter if Alex has no limbs, Michael is going to make sure that Alex understands he can have the man he loves – all he has to do is be there and ask.

* * *

Michael goes to the reunion, even though he’s not sure what to expect. When Alex had stood in front of his trailer to tell him he had to move, he didn’t say a word about the hotline. He doesn’t call him ‘Cowboy’, he doesn’t bring up any of the deeply intimate words that they’d exchanged over the last two years. He flirts with every pretty girl he can so he can use them as armor against Alex, but even then, there’s no avoiding the inevitable.

Still, the inevitable is really fucking confusing, when Alex confronts him about _drugs_ of all things.

“Are you really that desperate for money?”

Michael scoffs, shaking his head. “I don’t need to resort to drugs to make money,” he assures, and as much as he wants to add, _you should know that_, he doesn’t. He gets up to push past Alex, but he doesn’t get that far. Alex stops him in his tracks and Michael lets his body go still in Alex’s hold. 

When Michael exhales, it’s shaky. This close, he can practically feel Alex’s heartbeat and it’s taking every ounce of control in his body not to confront him about the fact that he’s spent two years (and who knows how much money) calling a sex line to talk to Michael, yet he can’t bother to have a real conversation with him face to face. 

He tries to push past Alex, because he can’t _do_ this. This bullshit where neither of them says what they mean isn’t working for him, and he’s tired of it.

“You trying to hold my hand, Private?” he drawls, trying to get a rise out of Alex, as if that will magically get Alex to budge or take action. He knows he’s being an asshole, but he’s tired of them being _stuck_. He’s using his sex line voice, he’s using the nickname that Alex had picked, and he’s still pressed right up against him. 

Alex scoffs, shakes his head, and when he turns, his breath is soft against Michael’s cheek. His words are anything but. “Does the macho cowboy swagger act ever get old?” Alex asks sharply, and when he bows his head, his breath shifts over Michael’s neck. It’s better than hearing the stupid modified voice over the phone line, but it’s doubly so because he’s got Alex right next to him. When he’d thought back to all those things Alex had said to him, he knows that the only thing that had been keeping them apart had been distance.

Jesse Manes is absolutely an obstacle, but not one so vast they can’t overcome it. 

Michael slides his hand down Alex’s forearm and tangles their fingers together so Alex can’t get too far away from him. Then, when he’s got him fixed in place, Michael leans in, biting his lip as he picks the right words.

“It didn’t for you, _Private_, or you would’ve stopped calling,” he drawls.

When he backs away, Alex looks pale. He stumbles back slightly, shocked, but he lets Michael keep holding onto his wrist. “You knew?”

“I mean, the voice modification software was kind of a bit much,” Michael admits, “but you were _not_ subtle. I take it you figured it out pretty fast.”

“I’d recognize your voice anywhere,” Alex says. “Even if I could barely hear, it’d still be the one thing I knew.”

Well, shit, that’s almost the most romantic thing Alex has ever said to him. 

They don’t move. They stand there, and for all the things they’ve said to one another, they vanish when they’re face to face. 

“It’s not drugs,” Michael says after that silence is _endless_. “You know how I’ve been making my money. You found nail polish remover. Acetone. Isobel spilt a bunch of it the last time she was over,” he says, and is so fucking glad that he can be honest in that, because she’d had a bit too much and it had gotten everywhere, so he’d taken out his blanket to shake it out.

Yeah, he’s also brewing it, but at least he can use the excuse.

“Besides, I wasn’t even making that much by the end,” Michael keeps going, riding that wave of bravery. “I kind of ditched all my other clients, because I only ever wanted to talk to the same one.”

He hears the catch in Alex’s breath. Even if he hadn’t, the struck look on Alex’s face tells him the whole story. 

“Alex,” Michael says quietly. “Are we really going to stand here and pretend that the things we said to each other over the last year didn’t happen?” He shakes his head, pleading with him. “You told me you loved me. You said I was your home.” He slides his fingers over Alex’s hand and pulls him in. “Was it only because you felt safe, with all those miles between us? Or did you mean it?”

“I meant it,” Alex says, after a nervous swallow. “What if what I want doesn’t matter?” 

Michael tips his head to the side, because it’s _painfully_ sweet and sad that Alex could think that. 

“I think what you want is the only thing that matters.” 

The music is still playing around them and they’re surrounded by their high school peers. If something happened now, there wouldn’t be any more hiding. It’s why Michael needs to stay patient. He waits, but he’s only going to wait for so long before he takes matters into his own hands.

Luckily, he doesn’t need to wait much longer at all.

Alex grabs Michael by the face and pulls him in for the desperate kiss that Michael’s been dreaming of for _years_ and when he does, there’s no holds barred. Michael crowds into Alex’s personal space, his fingers sliding through Alex’s soft hair as he holds onto him, swaying forward to kiss him, every word Alex has said over the last two years flickering back to his mind. He’s panting by the time Alex drifts back, but he doesn’t let him go. 

Instead, he slides his fingers over Alex’s cheeks as the din of people around them starts murmuring, but Michael couldn’t give a fuck about them.

“We have a lot to make up for,” Michael murmurs.

The sound of assent from Alex is good enough for him, and Michael proudly wonders if it’s because he’s made him speechless. Maybe Alex thinks that Michael means dating or kisses or even what happens behind closed doors, but he has something else very specific in mind.

“I want to hear every last thing you told me over the hotline, but this time, from your voice,” he says, not exactly a demand, but something close. “You think we could manage that? If that’s something I want?”

Alex finally opens his eyes and the sadness is gone from the furrow of his brow and the downturn of his lips. “Yeah,” he breathes out, barely more than a disbelieving whisper. “I think we can, Cowboy.”

That’s worth every single damn cent he’d made over the last two years, and to celebrate it, Michael leans forward to kiss him again, asshole high school classmates be damned.

* * *

“Hey baby,” Michael drawls, waking Alex from his sleep. He’s about to protest that Michael takes his sex calls in another room when he sees exactly where he’s positioned. Then, he remembers that he’s awake and Michael hasn’t worked the sex line in years, and definitely not since they moved in together.

There he is with his innuendo-laden grin aimed right up at him from where his mouth is positioned near Alex’s cock. His underwear are gone, which means that Michael must have stripped them off in his sleep. He lets out a strangled, surprised moan, and when Michael works his mouth in a perfect ‘o’ around the tip of his cock and sucks briefly, that sound only magnifies. 

“G-Guerin,” Alex breathes out raggedly. 

Michael draws back with a wet _pop_ sound. “Cowboy,” he corrects. 

“No,” Alex disagrees. “_Guerin_. You don’t have to. I’m not paying by the minute anymore.”

“Nah, this one’s on the house,” Michael agrees.

That’s all the warning he gets before he swallows Alex deep before proceeding to take him apart in all the ways he’d promised to do over that two-year stretch. Alex is _deeply_ grateful that these days, he’s Michael’s only client. Alex has to admit that the real thing is much better than hearing it over the phone. 

His mouth is also much better put to use in person, proven when he hums and flicks his tongue a little over the tip of his cock, causing Alex to grab the sheets of the bed, hips snapping up as he moans, “_Michael_,” and comes, slumping back on the bed, panting. 

He’s throwing out the alarm clock and making Michael do that _every damn day_. 

Peering past his forearm where it’s collapsed over his eyes, he stares at Michael with a dazed, happy look. “Come here,” he beckons, tugging at Michael’s shoulders, pulling his curls (even if Michael whines for it), and eventually gets him where he wants him.

That’s where Alex can kiss him and remind himself that he’s _home_ and it’s not because he's in a cabin in Roswell, or because it’s New Mexico, or even because he’s out of the Air Force. He’s home because he’s kissing Michael Guerin, whose lips taste of Alex’s come, and it’s filthy and perfect and everything he ever wanted. 

He kisses every one of Michael’s fingers, like he’d promised to do, and when he finishes, he does it again, backwards. He collapses back with his head on the pillow, staring fondly at Michael. 

“So,” Alex murmurs, reaching down to get his hand on Michael’s cock. “_Cowboy_. How about you tell me exactly what you want and I’ll think about giving it to you?”

“You planning to charge me?”

“Steep prices,” Alex guarantees, mock-serious as he nods. “You’re gonna have to pay with the rest of your life, with me.”

Michael hisses, inhaling sharply. “Fuck. I mean, I’m gonna have to think about that…” He yelps when Alex squeezes the base of his cock, then dissolves into laughter as he gives Alex a slow, sweet smile. “I’d pay that twice,” he guarantees, and leans in to kiss him, sealing that promise as Alex proceeds to start taking him apart in every single way he’d promised over the last two years. 

Lucky for Alex, Michael has proven that he’s absolutely good for his promises, so he’s got a long while to take advantage of this man in his bed, in his life, and in his heart.


End file.
